


Come What May

by Catchclaw



Series: Mental Mimosa [320]
Category: Star Wars Prequel Trilogy, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: F/M, Fix-It, Love, M/M, Movie: Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker, Resurrection, Schmoop, Seriously Unrepentant Schmoop, Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker Spoilers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-24
Updated: 2019-12-24
Packaged: 2021-02-25 23:08:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,395
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21943384
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Catchclaw/pseuds/Catchclaw
Summary: When he slips through her fingers, she knows.
Relationships: Obi-Wan Kenobi/Anakin Skywalker, Rey/Ben Solo
Series: Mental Mimosa [320]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1012767
Comments: 8
Kudos: 130





	Come What May

**Author's Note:**

> Inspired by [this amazing comic](https://catchclaw.tumblr.com/post/189848302207).

When he slips through her fingers, she knows. 

It’s like a knot loosening, like sinking sand, like the last moment of a dream before she realizes that she’s asleep.

“Ben?” she says, a question with already an answer, for he’s falling, sinking from her arm and onto the cold, dead dirt, and by the stars, damn it, she _knows._

She knows but still she hears herself think: _Surely the Force can’t be so cruel._

But it is, she knows that now, because Ben is laying beside her, dead, the energy of his life humming in her body. She breathes because he doesn’t; she can touch him now because his fingers lie open and cold. He is the only reason, one in a thousand different shades, that she lives and the shock she feels, the emptiness in her--oh, the loneliness! She’d forgotten what it felt like.

And his body’s flickering now, like a candle left out to burn, one gutted by her tears. A whisper that is agony: “No. No! Not yet.”

The Force wants him, she can feel it--the coffin of the Sith sings with it--but he’s still hers, isn’t he? He is hers forever and now forever is an empty place and how can the Force expect her to live the rest of her life this way, with the taste of ash in her mouth, without the firm, forgiving grip of his hands?

She wants to scream but the air won't come because Ben is dead, she thinks, she knows, she cannot understand--and with a single, perfect kiss, the revocation of a gift, she's been hollowed out.

 _More room for the light_ , a voice whispers. _It can’t be avoided, Anakin She’ll need it to face what’s to come._

 _No_ . Another voice, one she’d heard as she stared into Palpatine’s failing flesh, clear and strong. _She doesn’t need the Force for that, Master. She’ll need him. She’ll need love._

A sigh, one borne of deep affection. _You’re going to do something foolish, aren’t you?_

_Yes. If that’s what it means to do right. You know how it is, Obi-Wan. Sometimes the Force gets it wrong._

And then there’s a hand on her shoulder, one she can sense but not feel.

“Rey.”

“Go away.” The blade in her voice surprises her. “Master Jedi, you’ve done enough.”

“I think,” the other voice says, older and richer, “that’s what we’re supposed to be telling you, isn’t it? Only one of us here destroyed the Sith today. Though I hope we were of some assistance.”

Ben’s body softens beneath her hands, ice melting in the sand, and she cries out at last, a burst of sudden, wrenching pain, and she can feel the Force contract around her, vibrant, a lash of color and energy that she cannot contain.

“Rey.” That hand again. “Look at me.”

She doesn’t want to. She does.

The man bidding her is younger than she’d expected, almost boyish. He has dark curls he keep sweeping back from his face--a face she doesn’t recognize but that’s incredibly familiar.

“I’m Anakin,” the man says simply. And she _knows_.

“Master Skywalker!”

“And this is Obi-Wan Kenobi, but never mind that.”

The bearded figure beside him crosses his arms. “Excuse me?”

“But what are you--?” Her stomach turns over, bewilderment churning with fear. “What’s happening? I don’t understand.”

Anakin nods at Ben, a flicker of grief on his face. “I’m here for you, Rey. To help him.”

And then Anakin--Ben’s grandfather, Darth Vader, a figure of fear and destruction and pain--is kneeling on the opposite side of Ben’s body. It flickers, now. Oh, how it fades.

“He’s beautiful,” Anakin says. His eyes turn up to Rey’s face. “He’s beautiful because he found you.”

“The Force brought us together.”

Anakin’s hands spread and paint a living wave that ripples from Ben’s head to his feet. “Maybe. But the Force doesn’t know everything. It can’t live your life for you. It can give, yes, but what you do with that gift, that’s what counts.”

“Rey,” Obi-Wan says softly. “It’s all right now; you can let go of him. Anakin has him.”

“No!” Angry tears in the word. “I can’t! If I do, he’ll--” She can’t say it. If she says it, it will happen, and if it happens, she’ll--

“Shhhh.” She can feel Obi-Wan’s presence around her, soothing, a rock she can lean against. “Just a little bit, dear one. That’s it. That’s it. Stay here for him, yes? For Ben. We’ve not long to wait.”

And then she isn’t at Ben’s side but Obi-Wan is, sitting where she had, and he’s reaching into the wave, feeding it, building it with his own.

“Nice of you to show up,” Anakin says. His eyes are closed now, his mouth a thin, solid line.

“You know me,” Obi-Wan says. “I like to arrive right on time.”

It’s only when their hands meet that the wave begins to hum; only when they tangle their fingers that it lets its breath out, it seems, and _sings_ , and she knows in that moment that there is love between them, Anakin and Obi-Wan, a love made of darkness and light, for where Anakin’s energy falters, Obi-Wan’s is right behind him, and where Obi-Wan’s fades, Anakin’s rushes in to complete.

“I’ve made a lot of mistakes in my life,” Anakin says.

Obi-Wan says: “So have I.”

Anakin smiles, a small perfect thing. “Let me make this right. Let us make this right.” 

It becomes a chant between them, repeated again and again: “Let me make this right. Let us make this right. Let me make this right. Let us make this--Let me--Let us--”

And then the land of dead in which they’ve come to rest suddenly bellows with promise and joy and Rey knows that somehow, now, Ben is _alive_.

“Rey?” His eyes are open; the ghosts are gone. “Rey?”

He’s solid under her hands now: his face, his chest, his hands. And when she kisses him, he makes a soft, startled sound and strokes her tears as he kisses her back.

He looks up at her, dazed, his dark head back in the dirt. “What happened? I thought I was--didn’t I die?”

“You did,” she says, her fingers tangled in his shirt. “You were gone. But the Jedi brought you back.”

“The Jedi? I don’t understand.”

There’ll be a time when she can explain it to him. That’s what she tells herself, because right now, it feels unimportant. What matters is that he’s here and he’s holding her, moaning for her as his fingers reach for the knots in her hair.

 _They really should leave_. Master Kenobi’s voice, irritated. _This whole planet’s about to crack open, and here they are doing...this._

_You’re far too practical, you know that?_

_Hardly. I just don’t want to see all our work go to waste when they’re crushed by a falling star destroyer or some such._

_They love each other,_ Anakin says. There’s a hint of a smile. _Right now, that’s more than enough. Right now and always. Falling destroyers notwithstanding._

_Maybe I should go back out there and push. There really is no need for them to be--_

_Master. Mind your own business._

_I am. I’m simply saying that--_

Anakin turns, tugging Obi-Wan with him, and the temple of the Sith falls away and all around them are the stars, the infinite beauties of the universe. The space inbetween them all called the Force.

 _I’m glad there’s no one left to tell them that they shouldn’t love each other_ , Anakin says softly, a voice that sounds to the living like a flicker of leaves. _I’m glad that they’re going to have what we couldn’t._

 _Well,_ Obi-Wan says, the word a quiet brook, _I’m grateful we have it now. Eternity would be quite boring without you._

A tree bending in the wind, a smile. _Yes, Master_. _I love you, too_.

“I love you,” Ben says against Rey’s cheek.

“Good,” she whispers, turning her mouth to his again. “And I’ll never let you go again.”

Ben grins and in that smile, she can feel their future, see it sharp and exquisitely clear: his arms around her, her hands on his face, the bond between them forever unbroken, in this life and beyond. “Sweetheart,” he murmurs. “Don't worry. You won't have to."

**Author's Note:**

> Tagging this as an MM because I wrote it in one sitting. And no, I haven't been listening to the _Moulin Rouge_ soundtrack on repeat. Why on earth would you think that?


End file.
